First CoC game of the New Year

As promised another blog to follow a game that Jason and I played on Sunday gone, Too fat Lardies Chain of Command rules covered the 1940's France game that took place between, my Wermacht forces and Jason's newly painted Highlanders (surely doomed as it was their first outing!!!)

Again this has been plagiarised from Jason's Welsh Wargamer in Devon blog, as he took all the pictures and was up of most the night, insomnia has its benefits...

My German platoon of 4 squads, commanded by 2 senior leaders, supporting them I had a 50mm mortar, a medic and a Stug III.  Jason had a British platoon with 3 smaller squads, again lead by 2 senior leaders.  Support was a Boys AT rifle team, a 2" mortar, a Matilda II and a FOO with a 3" mortar battery on call.

The table looks mostly open, but the fields all blocked line of sight and made for limited long range fire opportunities.  The German jump off points are marked in red, the British are in blue.  The terrain was made by our late friend Gus Murchie and it was nice to see it being put to use again.

 Turn 1 came and went in the initial German phase. I rolled four 6's and a 3 on 5 dice, giving me the next phase, a Chain of Command Dice and a random event. I brought on my first squad with the 3, then rolled for the event.  A random mortar stonk came down on my right flank, restricting my deployment and advance options, but luckily missing my deployed troops, Herr Mulligan!!!!      

 Then my next roll was three 6's as well, ending turn 2 before the British even got on the table. 
I slowly (5" on 3d6) advanced the squad, while also bringing on my sergeant.  The next move was more normal, allowing 2 more squads to come on while I pushed the initial squad forward to within 3" of one of the British jump off points.  Things were looking pretty bad for the British.

Jason finally got a phase and managed to bring on 2 squads and the platoon sergeant.  He couldn't deploy on the threatened jump off point as I had men too close to the jump off point, within 4". 
He did manage to get two 5's though, so his CoC dice was filling up.

Next turn I rolled again and declared a normal move to seize the jump off point.  2d6 were rolled, giving a move of 3" which looked like enough for the squad to get there, except they had run flat out the turn before and had a point of shock, which reduced the move to 2"!  God damn it..........   
My other dice allowed me to push forward one squad and also move over towards his left flank with the 3rd, while also bringing on the Stug.  The Brits were getting decidedly outnumbered.

 J's phase again and he got two 6's, giving him the next phase.  He pushed both squads forward, with the 1st going 5" on 3d6 and the other going 16" on the same number of dice.  The Sergeant moved up and rallied the shock off his troops.

 This time J got several 5's, giving him a CoC dice in his hand.  This was used to move the threatened jump off point away from the Germans, saving him from a nasty force morale loss.  At the same time the 1st squad went on overwatch and the 2nd moved around to flank the Germans.

A couple of quick phases resulted in the Germans advancing 3 squads, taking fire from the British infantry as they came on and then the German left got threatened by the high speed (17" on 3d6!!!) move of the Matilda II. Feel the speed....

 Sustained and effective Bren Gun fire caused 5 shock to the German leftmost squad, while the rest of the British troops fired at the advancing Germans.  The FOO was also on, and made contact with his mortars.

 Some effective fire by the advancing Germans saw the British leftmost squad get pinned down.  Those damn MG34s lay down a lot of fire, while the small 8 man squads of the British make them very fragile.  On the other flank the Matilda revved its mighty engine and ground forward, crushing several Germans and breaking the squad.  Achtung Panzer!

 However, C squad was looking ropey and, if they broke then the British left was wide open.

 Luckily the FOO stepped up and saved the day.  Two 6's gave J the next phase and the mortars came in with a whoosh BANG.  Unfortunately for me, all his squads were within the 18" blast area, along with my sergeant and the Stug.  All the infantry were pinned and the Stugs CO decided that he didn't like being shelled.  Losses were few from the mortars, with the noteable exception of one of the MG34 teams, which was wiped out to a man by a single, lucky mortar shell.

When the mortars fired again on the next phase, I had decided that the attack was over and pulled my men back. 

Victory went to the defenders of the realm, who held out despite being outgunned and outnumbered.  A great game, with the result swinging from a German victory to a crushing defeat, thanks largely to the mortars. I still feel these are very mighty gods of war for the 4pts you spend on the support options. 

Thanks for the game Jason, it was a blast, literally, Gus would have laughed his socks off at that game.